Reconstructed
by 4plato
Summary: My post finale story. Dying is easy, its living that's hard
1. Chapter 1

House decided being dead was easy, at least for him it was. He used to tease Wilson about caring too much, more specifically about hoping that caring enough would keep him alive indefinitely. Now he realized he'd invested in the puzzles for basically same reason, to keep himself feeling alive without understanding that feeling alive was unnecessary to actually being alive. You could live quite well and not feel it. Better in some word Zen flashed somewhere near the edge of his mind.

" Wouldn't labeling it Zen make it unZen? Unzenning Zen." he thought and then smiled, he still liked being him.

House was sitting on a park bench in Somewhere, Ohio staring at his long legs stretched out before him. Thinking nonsense. Quietly waiting on a friend.

Wilson was still in the motel room, standing by the window staring at House staring at his legs. The long hours on the motorcycle didn't seem to have effected him much. If anything he looked better, had put on a little weight, tanned up a bit, the creases around his eyes seemed less defined. Which was not as unexpected as the fact that he could say the same thing about himself. Six weeks into his magical cancer tour and he was looking better than he had when they'd started. Even stranger, he felt great. Rested, relaxed, caught up on his sleep. The symptoms that should have started nipping at him weeks ago were either three steps behind or three steps ahead of him.

Living in the eye of the hurricane. Tight rope walking over the abyss. Whistling in the dark.

"And yet", he thought, "that isn't the oddest part of it." His looking and feeling better was nothing compared to the fact that he was living 24/7 with the renown Dr. House who apparently had either not noticed his lack of deterioration or he had noticed and decided not to comment on it. Two possibilities equally hard to believe. And equally fascinating to contemplate.

Yet, he made a calculated decision not to think about it. Thinking about it would lead backward. They had somewhat successfully left House and Wilson behind. They were now living life as the Wonderfully Wistful Wouster Brothers. Thinking about any of it, the cancer, the lack of symptoms, House's lack of interest would just weaken the carefully constructed wall they had built to protect themselves from what was waiting around one of those bends out there. "Exactly my point" Wilson noted. "I'm thinking of him as House. Not Kirk". Kirk being the name House had chosen, letting Wilson keep Kyle as his own.

Wilson grabbed his back pack and headed out of the door quickly. This was not something he wanted to think about.

Not now. Not yet. Not ever.

Wilson had just opened the door when he saw House reach down, pick up a small blue canvass bag from the ground and put it on his lap. For some reason, it was that exact moment Wilson realized he couldn't remember House ever being without it. Ever. Not in bars, or on walks or even going to the bathroom. He carried it everywhere. And at night? Wilson tried to mentally reconstruct the room as it was just before they'd gone to bed, but couldn't place it anywhere. House had a regular back pack, a black one with his clothes and pills in it. This canvas bag was different. Wilson tried to remember if he had ever seen House take anything out of it. Nothing. Well, a cigarette lighter once.

Damn it. This would be harder not to think about.


	2. Chapter 2

Funny, but in the end it wasn't the contents of the blue canvass bag that smacked James Wilson back to reality, but a slight shake of a head. House's head. Now,granted, the blue canvass bag played its part, started him thinking. Maybe even the fact that they finally shared a bed was also significant, but that's another story and besides all this analyzing is just a way to avoid looking at what really happened. Cause if you don't look at what really happened then, you don't have to think about what came next, and that was fine with Wilson, probably House too. Digression is a great way to regroup and prepare, boy scouts should have a digression badge.

What happened. Well, the first night Wilson got out of his bed with the intention of sneaking the blue bag out from under House's bed to check its contents, he had been undone by an almost empty bottle of Scotch. The idea was the Scotch would serve two purposes.

First just the smell of it on his breath would give him a ready excuse should House wake up and find his best friend laying on the floor beside his bed obviously checking for monsters or something. Second, he needed something to dull his fear as he comtemplated House waking up and finding his best friend, etc., etc. So Wilson discovered nothing that night except the folly of including 20 year old Scotch in a seach party.

The second night, the weather stopped him cold, and yes that is a terrible pun. They had no computers or phones or anything that might have warned them about the coming rain, sleet, hail storm that was bearing down on the area, as the local meteorologist had so correctly predicted on a weather report neither of them had seen.

They were lucky to find a cheap motel with several rooms available for the night. They were unlucky in that their room had only a small radiator to produce heat, which it didn't. The later it got the colder and more damp the room became. House called the front desk to ask for more heat or some more blankets or a hooker, anything, but a recording told him that the front desk closed at ten pm and if this was an emergency he should call the local sheriff's office or the hospital. Wilson vetoed calling the hospital for either blankets or desperate nurses. They lay in their separate beds, shivering. House cursing out Wilson for having consumed the last of their Scotch the night before. Then he got up and went over to Wilson's bed. Without a word he pulled back the covers and got that was it. Nothing romantic or erotic. They spent their first night together back to back, deciding rubbing butts didn't need commentary. At least that is how they fell asleep, but when Wilson woke up, he found House had one leg and one arm draped across him. He found it was ...OK. He listened for a moment to the soft sound of someone breathing close to him. Remembered other nights, other breaths.  
He settled back into the sound. Yeah, it really was OK.

They spent the next day in that room, watching the weather, devouring their store of sandwiches, beef jerky and oreos. House did go out for beer. It was the longest they had simply sat and talked since beginning the road trip. Maybe that was what triggered Wilson's rediscovery of his friend and his ability to read him. Maybe that was where it all started to unravel.


	3. Chapter 3

The weather had started to clear, but it was already getting dark, so they decided to brave the cold and stay in the No Heat Motel one more night. And most likely sleep together again, though neither of them mentioned that part of it. Conversation was hampered by House's sudden interest in The Wheel of Fortune but he did have his own set of rules that made it a bit more challenging. Before each puzzle he'd announce the answer had to be either Medical or Dirty. Wilson lost the first three rounds, got pouty and decided to call his mother.

"Mom and Dad regret they are not home at the moment." he announced as he started to put the phone back in his pocket. "I still have about half an hour left on this card. You wanna call your Mom?"

"Nope" House shook his head slightly. He'd stopped playing the Wheel and was now rummaging through a pile of discarded fast food containers looking for a half eaten hamburger, cold French fries, anything.

"Come on, you haven't called her since we left Princeton" Wilson suddenly felt uneasy. He looked around the room, even tried for a moment to find a dirty word that fit '_ G_OT_E'. "Why wouldn't you wanna call your mother?" Ideas were forming, maybe if House came up with a good explanation they'd stop.

"My mother is fine. Mr. and Mrs. Bell were on their way to Scotland for a family reunion last I knew." House offered quickly, adding an even quicker smile, as if he sensed he had precious little time to block the Wilsonian thought process before it took flight.

"But its been weeks, no way is she not worried about you. Out here on the road with everything that's..." Wilson stopped. It was useless. The ideas, the images, the logical fear of understanding of how House's mind worked all came crashing in at once.

House threw an empty McDonald's bag into the trash. "I'm going for a pizza."

"No, not yet. I need..." Wilson said softly, staring out the window, eyes squinting as if something was just slightly out of focus. Then the eyes closed. "She doesn't know, does she?"

House sat down on the bed. It was too late, the Grand Hoovering Dam of Insight and Judgement had broken and now all he could do was try and minimize the damage.

"Why would you not tell your mother you didn't die in that fire? How could you NOT tell her." Wilson finally looked over at him.

The question hung in the air between them, slowing time and sharpening instincts.

"You really don't know or are you just dragging this out for dramatic effect?" House's voice was cold the way it used to be, the way Wilson remembered it. The way that made him understand Mardi Gras was over and the time for masks was done.

Wilson sat down on the bed opposite him, his hands smoothing the bedspread, calmly. He knew and House knew he knew. He was just formulating his plan of action, just searching for the best opening line. For one brief moment House hoped that maybe, just maybe, he'd gotten it wrong.

Then Wilson looked up.

"There's only one reason you'd let your mother go through the pain of thinking she was burying her son. So she wouldn't have to do it a second time."


End file.
